Mustafa Dzhemilev

Mustafa Dzhemilev (13 November 1943-) was the Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People from 1991 to 2013, preceding Refat Chubarov.

Biography
Mustafa Dzhemilev was born on 13 November 1943 in Ay-Serez, Crimean ASSR, Russian SFSR, in the Soviet Union to a family of Sunni Muslim Crimean Tatars. He grew up in exile in Uzbekistan after the USSR exiled most of the Tatars during World War II, and Dzhemilev became a Tatar activist. From 1966 to 1986, he was arrested six times by the Soviet government, serving time in labor camps, prisons, and house arrest. In May 1989, he returned to the Crimea, and 250,000 other Tatars also decided to return home. In 1991, Dzhemilev became the Chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People, representing his people in the government of newly-independent Ukraine. In 2014, when the Crimean people held a referendum on joining Russia, Dzemilev was in Ankara, Turkey; he declared that the results were manipulated by Russia and illegal. Dzhemilev was later banned from entering Crimea, and on 21 January 2016 the State Council of Crimea issued an arrest warrant for Dzhemilev. He headed to free Ukraine, joining the Petro Poroshenko Bloc.